Inside the first AI-powered football match full of glitches

TechnologyFootball
30 Jun 2025 • 7:02 PM MYT
The Independent
The Independent

The world’s most free-thinking newspaper

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  • The first-ever fully autonomous three-on-three humanoid football match, powered entirely by artificial intelligence, was held in Beijing.
  • During the games, some robots collapsed and had to be carried off on stretchers by humans, despite being designed to self-right, while others struggled with basic actions.
  • The event served as a preview for the upcoming World Humanoid Robot Games in China, highlighting the country's strategy to advance AI-powered humanoid robots through sports competitions.
  • Cheng Hao, CEO of Booster Robotics, stated that sports offer an ideal testing ground for developing humanoid robot algorithms and hardware-software systems, with safety being a primary concern for future human-robot interactions.
  • Tsinghua University's THU Robotics team won the championship, defeating China Agricultural University's Mountain Sea team with a score of 5-3.

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